Advent Ground
by Jan-Ken-Pon
Summary: [Written by Sosiqui] 25 years before the Graylands Incident, Duke Bardorba is desperate to end the civil war between Lea Monde and the rest of Valendia... but is he desperate enough to accept the offer brought by a strange late-night vistor? {Prequel fic,


Author's Note: Finally, my first Vagrant Story fic is finished! Hopefully, it will be the first of many.

This fic **contains spoilers** for the game - although it doesn't spoil everything, it does hit up one or two plot twists. If you haven't finished playing Vagrant Story, hit the back button and come back when you have completed the game. It's worth it to experience the Vagrant Story's great plot without any hint of what's going to happen next.

Anyway. This is a prequel fic. The title is the name of a room in the Catacombs, if you're curious. And obligatory disclaimer: Square-Enix owns Vagrant Story, not me.

* * *

_Twenty-five years before the 'Graylands Incident' and the final fall of Leá Monde…_

"What does my lord want of me?" Duke Aldous Bardorba stalked around the edges of the room like a caged animal, ignoring the glances exchanged by the servants. He waved away an offer of wine. "No. No! I cannot afford to muddle my brain with wine… more light. More light!"

The light flickered as a servant switched a nearly-gone candle for a fresh one, sending a brief flare of brightness over the parchment-covered table in the center of the room. Maps and diagrams competed for the Duke's attention – but they held no answers, and the new light did not illuminate any hidden secrets.

"What does my lord want of me?" he repeated, sitting down abruptly in a chair and rubbing at his temples. "Retake Leá Monde for Valendia, he says, as though it were as easy as buying a chicken at market. Feh…" The parchments rustled as he pawed through them again. "Outer walls strong as iron, passageways without number below – a veritable maze. The river flows through the city, but there's no weakness there either, and it provides them with water. A siege would be nigh-useless… where is my opening? This is a war for diplomats to wage with words, not soldiery! What use is it to break the armies of Valendia to pieces against their walls?"

The servants simply listened to the outburst without responding, as was their place. Duke Bardorba leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

He could not fail here. It simply was not an option. The sovereign had laid this job squarely on his shoulders. _Quell this uprising. Silence the traitors. Retake treacherous Leá Monde for Valendia, and end this civil war! I have faith in you, Bardorba._

_Faith_…

When the sovereign of Valendia professed faith in you, you did not let him down. If you did so, it was at peril of your very life… but it had been a full month and a half of laying plans, sending out orders to waiting regiments, all for naught. Leá Monde remained as impregnable as it had ever been. As time wore on, the very sight of the domes of the Great Cathedral within had begun to feel like mockery at his expense.

Parchment crackled as the Duke rose. "Are there any within the antechamber below?" he snapped at the nearest servant.

"A message-bird came, my lord. The head of the Knights of the Peace requests to see you." The servant bowed his head as he recited the message. "He wishes to speak of covert operations and Riskbreaker infiltration of Leá Monde, and should arrive within the hour."

Bardorba grunted at that; he was in no mood to bandy words at this time of night. "And is there no more news?"

The servant hesitated. "… Your son has asked after thee some hours past, my lord."

Bardorba let out a long, slow breath. "Has he… well. Inform me when our guest arrives. I shall be in my son's chambers."

"As you say, my lord." The servant stepped aside as Duke Bardorba left the room, pausing to stretch in the hallway before making the climb up the spiral stairs to his son's chambers.

The door creaked lightly as he entered; the governess sat up in her bed, startled, but he gestured for her to go back to sleep. She shook her head at him with the disapproval common to all mother-figures, but obeyed. The Duke quietly walked through to his son's bedroom, and peered inside.

Sydney was fast asleep, curled up into a little ball in the middle of his overlarge bed. Bardorba smiled despite himself at his sleeping son – such luxury, to be so untroubled at such a time. Feathers shifted under him as he sat down at the foot of the bed.

The young boy uncurled a bit, his eyes opening slowly. He blinked a few times, then sat up. "Father?"

"Aye. No, lie still – it is late for you." Bardorba knew the words were futile; Sydney squirmed out from under the linens anyway and clambered down the length of the bed to join him. "You should not be up at this hour."

"Then why did you come in?" Sydney tilted his head playfully at his father, blond hair falling over his face a bit. "You could have come sooner."

"I was busy." The Duke's brow furrowed; Sydney frowned.

"You're always busy. I never see you. What's going on?"

"War takes more time with real soldiers." His eyes traveled over the small, wood-carved battalions spread across Sydney's floor.

"When are they going to stop?" Sydney pouted. "It's not fun anymore."

"No. No, it isn't." He ruffled his son's hair. "It will go well with us, however." A simple lie, but the boy nodded and accepted it, then blinked as a soft knock came on the door.

It was the servant. "The head of the VKP waits below, my lord. Young lord," he added, nodding at Sydney.

Bardorba sighed. "I must go. You go back to sleep; I'll not have the nurse flaying me for making you tired."

Sydney grinned. "Right to sleep. I'll dream about you winning, Father."

"Surely it will be true, then…" He tousled Sydney's hair again before getting up. "Rest well, my son."

"G'night." Sydney watched them go, curling the linens around him so that he became a little mound in the center of the down mattress.

The Duke shook his head as he left Sydney's chambers, mentally preparing himself for this next meeting. What could the Riskbreakers do, anyway? Surely one or two lone men couldn't take down a city like Leá Monde from within.

He descended the spiraling stairs deep in thought, then paused at the back door to the antechamber to compose himself before entering. He could show no weakness here, either.

"Welcome," Bardorba said smoothly as he opened the door and entered the room. Candles flickered on the sideboard; the messenger-bird was incongruously perched on the back of one of the chairs. The Duke frowned at it, wondering why it was here. "Will you take wine before we begin?" he asked the other man, who was looking out the window, cloaked and hooded.

Behind him, the door clicked closed.

"I will," the figure said, and a chill ran up Bardorba's back. The voice was unmistakably female, though the form was certainly stocky… surely, a man? But no man ever spoke in such a way…

"Who are… I called for no whore," the Duke hissed, reaching for the bell-cord to call his personal guard. "Get out." He pulled on the cord, only to hear utter silence save the sputtering of candles and the rustle of cloth as the figure turned.

"They will not hear you," the figure said, softly. The Duke made as though to draw his dagger, but was met only with laughter. "But neither shall I harm you. I merely bring a proposition, good Duke. I come from Leá Monde."

"A spy, then?" Bardorba tensed. "What is this? Where is the man I was told was here?"

"Before you, to all eyes but yours," and the figure turned. And as the duke watched, the stocky, male figure seemed to melt away like snow in the sunlight, leaving only the slight form of a cloaked woman in front of him.

The Duke stumbled backwards. "Sorcery!"

"I would not be too quick to dismiss such things, were I you." The woman lifted one hand; the messenger-bird flew to her, its shape changing in mid-flight from that of a pigeon to a bat. "As I have said, I bring a proposition to aid you…"

"Who are you? What are you?" the Duke hissed.

"I come from Leá Monde," the woman repeated. "I am called Müllenkamp."

"Müllenkamp…!" The Duke backed away from her still more, his eyes bulging. "Tell me not such outrageous stories. That dark dancer is long dead, before the time of Iocus!"

"Before the time of Iocus in Leá Monde, yes… but dead? Do I truly appear so?" She tilted her head at him, a tone of genuine curiosity in her voice as she reached up and lowered the hood of her cloak.

Underneath she was fair, dangerously so. The Duke licked his dry lips. "Dead you may not be, but the rest of thy claim…"

"Can you look at me and say you doubt it?" And she stared at him, one eyebrow arched.

Bardorba tried to look away from her eyes, but could not. They drew him like lit pools, dark tunnels, all the ridiculous words bards used when trying to woo a fair lady. He had always laughed at the overblown drama of such things before, but…

… but this was different. This was real, and deeply unsettling.

After a few moments, she looked away from him, and suddenly he could move again. "… I see the dark years written in your gaze," he managed, slowly.

"You are satisfied?"

"_Why are you here?_ What reason could such a creature have to come to me, now?" Bardorba sank into the nearest chair, hands trembling.

"Because I can offer you something you desire, and you may do the same for me," Müllenkamp said, utterly unruffled by his own discomfiture.

"And what could you possibly offer me that I could accept? I fear I will be damned just for looking upon thee," Bardorba said wearily. This was too much.

She leaned forward, eyes bright in the candlelight. "I offer you victory. I offer you Leá Monde."

Bardorba looked up, startled. Müllenkamp was smiling, faintly. "Victory… no! Not at peril of my soul," he hissed.

She laughed again. "I do not trade in souls like a common charlatan, Duke Bardorba. I ask merely for fair trade… a favor in exchange for power."

"Why would you offer me this?" the Duke demanded, stirring up resistance and sitting up straighter in his chair. "If you have this power, use it alone, and tempt me not…"

A slow smile spread across Müllenkamp's face, and Bardorba felt the brief surge of indignation freeze into fear within him. He wondered, vaguely, if this was what the mouse saw before the cat leapt forward with tooth and claw. "Tempt me not!" he repeated. "In the name of Iocus!"

Her eyes narrowed sharply then. "Iocus?" There was a bite of bitterness in the word that made the Duke flinch. "I will do nothing by command of that cursed name… that name that buried me and took my city. Those bright, high domes should be mine!"

"Y-you did not answer my question?" Bardorba managed. "Why do you offer me such things?"

Müllenkamp walked over to the window and flung it open with little care for the glass within; the odd bat-like creature flew out and into the night. "You want Leá Monde brought low… and I want much the same, in my own way."

"In your own way?" Bardorba repeated her words. "What mean you?"

"Iocus," and she hissed the word. "Leá Monde brought back to me, and Iocus brought low. Old, old spells written on the walls… the whitewash stripped away. There is power of old in Leá Monde, Duke, power more ancient than St. Iocus and his Great Cathedral. Power forgotten, but waiting below the surface."

"Why have they not used this power, if it exists?" the Duke said, carefully.

"It is hidden, long since covered over by Iocus, but it remains sleeping nonetheless. It needs only to be unlocked… and fed."

"Fed?" Bardorba felt slow, stupid, as though his mind was muffled. He would not let himself believe the words of this witch… but oh, such words…

"The wellspring will rise again if it is only fed, and then you may use it. I speak of power, my lord Duke." Her voice was silk-smooth. "You can unlock it, if you wish the key… I need but a sacrifice. No, that word is too stern – I'll name it a price to be paid, or a gift only you can give, to re-awaken what lies within. So Leá Monde will fall, you shall have victory, and your life will be spared."

He started at that. "How did you…"

"A man lives not long if he disappoints such a man as the sovereign of Valendia," she said. "It is common knowledge. Already the peasants begin to whisper of it, and cast dark glances towards this manor."

The duke suppressed a shudder.

"Power. Power to last all your life, and those of your children's children, for as long as your line lasts," Müllenkamp said softly. "You can move men of influence as though they were puppets and you the puppet-master. Parliament will eat from the palm of your hand."

Bardorba swallowed thickly. "And Leá Monde?"

"It will not be a concern to you."

"And the price?" The question was barely audible.

Müllenkamp merely smiled. The duke jumped as the back door to the antechamber opened.

"Father?"

Bardorba flinched as though he had been struck, then turned around. Sydney stood in the doorway, rubbing at his eyes sleepily with one hand, Müllenkamp's messenger-creature fluttering ominously behind him. "This strange bat came, and…"

"Sydney," the duke said evenly, despite the sudden surge of panic deep within.

"Who's that?" the boy asked, pointing at Müllenkamp as the door clicked shut behind him.

"… the price?" Bardorba breathed. "My son is…?"

She nodded, slowly. "He shall wield the key that will unlock Leá Monde. And he will not be lost to you, no… he shall be your right hand, guiding the power of Leá Monde to your bidding. He shall grow strong, and there will be another gift…"

"A present?" The duke cringed once more as Sydney came up beside him, his eyes wide with curiosity. "Did she bring a present?"

"What gift?" Bardorba stared at Müllenkamp as she smiled and reached out towards Sydney.

"Immortality. Once he reaches his prime, he will age not, but remain forever as full of life and health as one could ever wish. Can you give him what I would, my lord Duke? Can you do better for your son?"

Sydney shrank back away from her, pressing into his father's knee. "What does she want?"

Bardorba took a deep breath and tried to think. "Sydney. She wants… to help Father win this war, but she would take you away, for a time… and you would do hard things… I do not want you to go."

Sydney looked up at Müllenkamp, eyes bright. "But… I want to help Father."

Something inside the duke broke, then. "Sydney…"

Sydney nodded, slowly. "I want to help you. Even if it's hard. I can do it." He lifted his small chin and looked stoutly at Müllenkamp.

She smirked. "Oh, such a bold lad you have, my lord Duke. Will you honor his wish?"

"I heard what the other boys said. That if you didn't take Leá Monde, you would…" Sydney turned and buried his face in his father's shirt. "I don't want you to die! Let me help you, Father!"

"If… if he is willing…" It took Bardorba a minute to realize the voice was his own. It sounded as though it was coming from very far away.

"Come then, Sydney," Müllenkamp said, holding out one hand to the boy. "We will go to Leá Monde. Would you like to see the armies move as toys before you? It will be a fun game."

Sydney looked at her, then stepped forward and put his smaller hand into hers. It was trembling, slightly. "If it will help Father... yes. Toys?"

"Oh yes, Sydney. Everything will be like a toy." She raised one eyebrow at the duke. "Be before the gates of Leá Monde with all under your command at dawn in three days. The city will fall to thee. Be brave, and you will paint yourself a better man than any in Valendia." Mullenkamp gathered Sydney to her and swept down in a brief, ironic bow, a look of barely-restrained glee playing across her face. "_Do _fare well, my lord Duke. You have made a bargain well-spent."

And suddenly, in a burst of wind from the window that nearly extinguished all the candles, both she and Sydney were suddenly gone.

The duke blinked owlishly in the sudden dimness of the room, then buried his face in his hands and wept.

…..

_Dawn, three days later…_

The Duke licked his lips nervously, and cast a glance to the horizon. The sun had not yet risen, but here he was, mounted and ready, and all the forces of Valendia under his command ranged around him. Just as Müllenkamp had instructed.

And he had no idea what to expect, what to do. He hoped whatever she was planning, that it would be quick – and that Sydney would return soon. The house had seemed so empty without the boy. He had told the servants and his governess that he had had the boy spirited away in the night for his own protection, to a far manor of his. The lie would hold for a short time. Hopefully Müllenkamp would require no more than that. He had spent the last night in vigil in the nearest Cloister of St. Iocus, praying, watching. Those who joined him had thought it was a prayer for victory.

His hands were shaking.

Leá Monde spread out before him, the guards on the ramparts watching the armies impudently, weapons at the ready but not yet shooting. It seemed a stalemate. It would be a stalemate, unless…

_Unless… _

The only warning was the sudden, violent movement of birds that seemed to fling themselves out of the nearby forests and into the air, making a sudden dark cloud in the sky. The Duke watched them with bated breath, before another flicker of movement caught his eye. Atop the Great Cathedral, was that-

His horse let out a wild whinny of panic as the ground beneath him twisted and bucked violently, nearly throwing him off. He caught a frantic glimpse of the guards atop Leá Monde's walls moving in panic before the horse spun and bolted, shouts of fear from both human and animal throats surrounding him as the gathered armies of Valendia were thrown into instant, wild chaos. And below it all was a slow, dark rumbling and cracking, as though all the bones of the earth were breaking.

The armies streamed backwards and away from the city walls in a state of pure panic as the ground rolled. The trailing flanks shrieked in fear as the earth's mouth gaped wide below them and swallowed up all those who were slow or unlucky. A massive chasm was stretching across the land between Leá Monde and the rest of Valendia; the sea outside the city was roiling wildly as well…

_What have I done?_ the duke thought in a blaze of fear before all his attention had to turn to keeping himself on the horse and unharmed.

And then, after what seemed like an eternity, the dull roar of the earthquake faded and died away, leaving only the frightened sounds of panicked animals and men. "What devilry is this?" a man near Bardorba shouted, his eyes wide as saucers. "The guards of Leá Monde are fallen! It seems silent as a tomb!"

A sudden inspiration struck the duke. What was it Müllenkamp had said? _You will paint yourself a better man than all in Valendia…_

"It is no devilry!" Bardorba cried out, turning on his horse until he spotted the nearest standard-bearer carrying the Rood of Iocus. "Iocus has granted us this victory!" He forced the exhausted horse over to the standard and plucked it from the grasp of the frightened bearer, then waved it wildly over his head, shouting so that all around him might hear. "Look at the power Iocus grants! My vigil was well-spent! Iocus! Iocus!"

"Iocus!" The men around him took up the cry, and he felt it spread outwards from him in great waves. "Iocus, Iocus!"

"And the Duke Bardoba!" someone added, suddenly, and that cry too spread. "Iocus! Iocus and the Duke! Victory in the name of Iocus and Duke Bardorba!"

The duke closed his eyes and continued waving the standard mechanically, even as the roar of the victorious armies towered around him, calling his name…

He could still see the two figures atop the Great Cathedral of Leá Monde – the slim shape of a woman, and the much smaller figure of a boy standing next to her, his hands raised up as though calling the earthquake forth.

Those around him thought the Duke wept for joy at glorious, god-given victory.

He did not choose to correct them.


End file.
